Christmas Campaign 2013 – Let the train pass! You are expected home for Christmas

It is Christmas time again and it does not really matter if the land will be covered with snow or not or if the surprise in your stocking is a bit bigger or smaller. The important thing is to know that there is someone thinking well of you and remembering you. So we go and visit our close ones, attend the Christmas parties organised in our schools, kindergartens, companies and organisations and thing almost constantly on buying presents and food for the Christmas dinner.

OLE and its cooperation partners have dedicated themselves also this year to helping these wonderful thoughts to come true. We remind all the people that they should be really careful when crossing railways. Even if you drive across the tracks in an off-road vehicle equipped with 12 airbags, a lorry or a tractor, for a train you are still just a snowflake that will be swiped away.

Unfortunately, last year we still had people who lost their lives on the Estonian railway lines. As in previous years, the main reason for those fatal incidents was distracted attention. In other words – at the time of crossing railways people were dealing with other things that appeared to be more important than paying attention to crossing railways. OLE finds that this “being away” syndrome is becoming epidemic and it would take more than just us to fight it. Of course, computers with all their programmes, games, films, music and million other exiting features have become an inalienable part of our daily lives. It is really regrettable that people take all of that with them when they to streets, buses or pedestrian crossings. So they attend a virtual rock concert, are fighting on a battlefield or laughing on someone’s stupid jokes when they step in front of a real train. So it happens that paramedics find at the scene of accident a functioning player or mobile phone but their listeners have already joined the virtual world…

Therefore, OLE and its cooperation partners wish to remind to all motor vehicle drivers and pedestrians once again that crossing railways is dangerous. The Christmas Campaign directed by OLE takes place on December 14-26 and bears the same slogan as in the previous years: “Let the train pass! You are expected home for Christmas.” With its campaigns, OLE wishes to contribute to making sure that all the Christmas wishes and greetings reach their addressees in this world, the real world.

During the campaign are published the advertising materials prepared by OLE that feature a father who has gone to forest to bring a Christmas tree and his family waiting for him at home. The father gets home but the video hints that things could have gone also the other way. We hope that the advertising materials we developed would help in making sure that no Christmas wishes are left untold.

The TV commercial is supported by a radio ad broadcasted in all Estonian radio stations, posters on streets and printed ads in newspapers. In addition, OLE continues making its railway safety presentations in schools.